The six foot man six feet under
by Benjamin Franklin Gates
Summary: The gravedigger is back! Don't worry, none of that Sci-fi crap and has taken Booth, he must find a way to survive with only an hour and a half of air before the squints can find him.
1. Chapter 1

"Bones?" Booth said, his voice echoed throughout the chamber where he was imprisoned. "Bones, can you hear me?"

He rubbed his forehead, it felt cool and damp… he was bleeding. He felt the rest of his body; he didn't feel any more blood and there were no obvious wounds. He knew that was good, if he was bleeding too badly, he'd probably die.

He reached into his front pocket. Crossing his fingers he pulled out his cell phone. He quickly maneuvered the phone around in that cramped space and opened it up. To his delight a small beam of white light filled the small enclosement. Seeing his external boundaries forced feelings of claustrophobia.

Although the phone did work he quickly noticed that there was no service. Quickly he decided to use the phone as a flashlight, moving the phone around the small space he desperately tried to find an exit, a crack, or something.

He flopped over onto his back and rubbed his hands across the top of the space. It was cool to the touch and it had an odd feeling of ruggedness to it. It definitely felt like concrete but there were no cracks that compromised the integrity of the room. Quietly he tried to connect with his inner squint and figure how much air he had left.

He knew that the container was long enough to hold him, which meant at least six and a half feet, and the space seemed to be a perfect square, probably one foot each way, that meant he had about six cubic feet of air. He didn't know exactly how long he had, he'd rather not think about that either, but he did know that the last thing he could remember was around 2 o'clock, and it was around three thirty, which meant he didn't have long…

-_24 hours earlier_—

"Knock, knock" Parker said with a slight giggle. Parker and Brennan were sitting in a booth at the _Founding Fathers. _He loved spending time with his father, and enjoyed it even more when they were with Dr. Brennan.

"Who's there?" Brennan asked quizzically.

"Orange!" Parker said.

"Orange who?" Brennan asked, although she already knew the answer, she had relentlessly used this joke on her brother years ago.

"'Orange' you glad I didn't say banana?" Parker said, he couldn't control himself as he was succumbed with laughter.

Booth approached and picked his son up. Hoisting him over his shoulder Booth looked at his face. "Are you telling Bones some silly jokes?"

"Yes, daddy!"

"Do you wanna go to the arcade?" Booth asked.

"Does Bones want to come too?" Parker asked.

Booth dropped him back down into his seat.

"I don't know, why don't you ask her?"

Parker looked at Dr. Brennan and began to open his mouth.

"I would love to come Parker." Dr. Brennan said, she forced a little bit of a smile.

"Why don't you go to the car?" Booth tossed Parker the keys.

"Can I play with the siren?"

"Sure." Booth kept the smile on his face until Parker walked out onto the sidewalk. "So you know, right."

"As much as the FBI was willing to tell me."

"Then you don't know anything." Booth said regrettably, he turned his head back and forth before leaning in to continue. "When the Gravedigger was in prison the Bureau put in a strong recommendation that she spend her term in solitary confinement and the state backed us on that, but due to overcrowding she was put into the general population."

"How does this have anything to do with what Cam told me?" Bones asked.

"I'm getting to that" Booth took a long sip of his coffee and then looked back into Brennan's eyes. "She talked, she told her cellmate everything she knew, international secrets, locations of diplomats, anything she had privilege to; everyone on cell block D has privilege to. But that's not the worst of it. She told this girl the location of the fifth victim, the one we never found."

"Wait, you don't think…"

"I do, I think we might finally the Debby Maddox case, the family can finally get some closure."

"Booth, she's been down there for a long time, this is not going to be as straight forward as we think it will."

"Bones, Maddox was my first assignment, and I looked that girl's parents in the eye and promised them I would bring the gravedigger to justice, and I promised I would find their little girl, I think it's time to make good on my promise."


	2. Chapter 2

Booth turned and glanced over his shoulder, his beautiful fiancé sat in the passenger seat of his fully loaded FBI special SUV. They were headed to Darren Maddox' house.

"Booth, I know you want to keep the family up with everything, but shouldn't we wait until we dig the girl up? I mean, knowing the gravedigger, we'll probably just find another puzzle down there." Brennan said, for the first time in a while she truly sympathized with a victim's situation, she had been kidnapped by the gravedigger, her and Hodgins spent hours underground fighting for their lives, and she knew exactly what Debby had felt in the moments before her death.

"Bones, if someone had information about your mother, would you have wanted to wait? How did it feel to find out about her only when you saw her lying on your exam table?" Booth said he knew that Brennan was just looking out for the Maddox family's feelings; they both knew too well that this could be some elaborate hoax, and that perhaps they would never find Debby.

Booth cut the wheel sharply, and suddenly the car slowed to a stop, they had arrived. This was the worst part of the job for Booth, he hated to tell people that their loved ones truly were dead, and that there was absolutely no hope.

Brennan was the first to slide out of the car, she lead the way to the door and took in a quick breath. "Are you ready, Booth?"

"Ready as I'll ever be."

Booth gave his standard three knocks. He took a half step back and looked up at the door.

After a few short moments and old man swung the door open. His face looked like it belonged on an elderly body, although he was only about 55 years old. His jaw had been unshaven for at least a week, and his eyes looked as if they'd sunk about a foot into his head.

"Agent Booth?" The man asked, he wiped his face with a greasy hand, and pushed back the few gray hairs that remained on his head. "Do you have any information about Debby?"

"You've seen the news?" Booth asked.

"Yes, sir! They said that sack of shit talked. Did she say anything about my Debby?"

"She did. Now of course, this is off the record?"

"Of course, agent Booth! Would you like to come in?" The man asked, he turned his large body, and pointed a thick short arm toward a hallway. "The living rooms just down the way."

He began to walk, and quickly he disappeared.

"Bones, don't talk. This guy is really crazy, he just wants some closure… let me do all the talking."

Booth and Brennan walked down the hallway and closed the door.

—_Meanwhile at the Jeffersonian_—

Hodgins quickly threw his things into a large duffel bag.

"Sweetie, you can pack your bags at the speed of light, but that little girl is still going to be buried until the FBI gets her out." Angela said, she was walking up the steps up to the platform looking into her Husband's eyes.

"Ange, this woman has ruined enough lives, and I want to be the first one in line to help close this case."

"How does it help? Who does it help? She is dead, and that awful woman killed her, knowing doesn't help."

Hodgins scoffed. "When we identify these remains, there will be a funeral, and a proper burial, and this little girl's parents can go to this grave and cry and they can reminisce, and they will never forget… even though she is still dead, they can be with her again." A tear poured down Hodgins' cheek before it became buried in his beard.

"I'm sorry, I understand where you're coming from, but I'd rather not know, I'd rather be able to have that little bit of hope in the back of my mind, that little bit of hope that makes me wake up in the morning and live my life. But when they know that she's dead, that's all over, there is no more hope."

"You have no idea how much closure I got when I saw her head explode, the only thing that would have pleasured me more is if Broadsky had let me take that shot."

"You don't mean that!"

"Ange, that bitch buried me alive, she almost killed me and Dr. Brennan because I showed up with test results in the wrong place at the wrong time! I did nothing to her, and for that, I would have loved to be her judge, jury, and executioner."

Hodgins picked up his bag and ran down the steps and out the door.


End file.
